1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for receiving and processing a broadcast signal by a portable terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently, portable terminals are being equipped with a dedicated processor for multimedia or have an enhanced multimedia function. Further, technologies for mounting a television function to the portable terminals are being released and technologies for mounting a digital broadcast receiver are currently being researched. Therefore, it is necessary for the current portable terminals to provide various multimedia functions, which results in the portable terminals having a more complicated structure and having to perform more complicated processes.
Accordingly, it is necessary for the portable terminals having a camera function and a multimedia function to receive data from various devices and process the received data. However, it is also preferred that such portable terminals have as small a construction as possible for the multimedia function, because the portable terminals are kept and carried by users. Therefore, current research is actively focused on developing portable terminals that can efficiently perform the multimedia function well, but are still small in size.
Currently, standardization for the digital broadcasting is being actively progressed worldwide. The digital broadcasting can be classified into Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) employed in United States and Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) employed in Europe.
A portable terminal equipped with a digital broadcast receiver as described above includes a tuner, a demodulator, and a decoder for receiving the digital broadcast. The tuner, demodulator and decoder for receiving the digital broadcast have a construction different from that of a typical RF unit, demodulator, and decoder of a portable terminal, respectively. That is, the digital broadcast receiver uses a frequency different from the communication frequency of the portable terminal and uses different demodulation and decoding schemes. Therefore, it is inevitable for the portable terminal to have a large volume in order to be additionally equipped with a digital broadcast receiver as described above.
Therefore, in implementing a portable terminal equipped with a digital broadcast receiver, it is possible to reduce the size and improve the processing speed of the digital broadcast receiver, if the received digital broadcast is processed in a way proper for the typical characteristics of the portable terminal. For example, the display unit of the portable terminal is small relative to that of a typical image processing unit, so it is limited in the size of the image it can display. Therefore, it is possible to reduce the size and improve the processing speed of the portable terminal if the portable terminal is equipped with a digital broadcast receiver capable of processing the broadcast signal in a way proper for the display unit of the portable terminal.